The present invention relates to a molten carbonate type fuel cell and more particularly it relates to an anode suitable to provide a fuel cell of high performance and long life.
It is most important for constructing a molten carbonate type fuel cell to choose highly corrosion resistant materials because this cell is very high in operating temperature, namely, about 650.degree. C. and besides contains a molten carbonate which is highest in corrosiveness. Especially, electrodes directly contact the molten carbonate and thus are placed under extremely severe conditions. Therefore, the anode may undergo considerable corrosion and especially important task is selection of materials for the anode which can stand operation of a long period.
Anode of conventional art comprises sintered nickel or a binary metal mainly composed of nickel. However, the binary metal suffers from the problems that addition of another metal, considering creep resistance and sintering resistance, may prolong the cell life, but may cause decrease of performance of cell and addition of another metal aiming at improvement of performance may improve performance, but cannot prolong the cell life. As related techniques, mention may be made of those disclosed in Japanese Patent Kokai Nos. 62-88272, 55-141071 and 57-25673.
The above conventional techniques have attached importance to only either one of prolongation of cell life or improvement of performance and have not been able to provide a cell of high performance and besides capable of being operated for a long time.